You’ll realise pretty quickly if you watch the film. Ruffalo’s character definitely makes some unflattering allusions to a certain US political figure, and many people are very easily triggered these days by any form of political satire.

I would not be surprised at all if a large portion of the negative reviews are from right wingers who took offence to the Ruffalo character.

Yes, I 100% agree about that bug execution scene. That was the “riot” scene I referred to, where her little character arc seemed to peak like there was about to be this big mask-off Starship Troopers moment. And then they just did nothing with it. So weird.

Yes I think it’s a much more impactful film if you watch it totally blind. It’s a shame you didn’t get to experience that.

The biggest flaw was how underdeveloped Kai was. She was set up in act 1, had a lot of screen time in act 2, then completely disappeared from existence for the entire last act except for one brief “oh yeah, here’s Kai” shot at the end.

I totally forgot about this! I completely agree, it was so bizarre how much screen time and development her character received in the middle of the film for it to ultimately lead nowhere. I thought for sure she was going to be setup as either a new love interest (with a twist where his previous lover turns on him) or setup as a new villain but they did neither. She didn’t even influence the plot in a sidekick role, she was just totally absent following the riot scene. I wonder if something was cut because it seemed like big inconsistency.

The only thing there I’d really agree with is the pacing, which is only an issue in the final third of the film. Your other complaints are sort of just about Bong Joon-ho’s style, most of his films are like that. I’m surprised you found them problematic considering he was one of the reasons why you went to see the film.

And to be honest I’m not really interested in watching someone else’s review of the film. If you want to discuss it then you should put the effort into articulating your thoughts here.

I agree with the others, I think this is a unusually negative take. However, the fact that you haven’t really explained your criticisms in any sort of detail makes it very difficult to determine whether you actually have a point or if you are the stereotypical 1 star rage reviewer on IMDB. I thought the film had its flaws, so I would be willing to hear more detailed reasoning from you.

I think this is a pretty good take, in line with other forms of effective protest. I don’t actually believe that most pirates are genuine protestors, though. They are just people who don’t want to pay but feel guilty about it, so instead of just admitting that they don’t want to pay they perform some moral gymnastics to rationalise their behaviour and keep the cognitive dissonance at bay. The average pirate’s train of thought goes something like this “you didn’t give me exactly what I wanted so now I am morally entitled to everything of yours for free until I decide otherwise”.

This dilemma has been explored previously by Red Letter Media, but they had a whole section dedicated to it in the middle of their recent ‘Presence’ review (by Steven Soderbergh), because it was raised again recently by Sean Baker in his acceptance speech at the Oscars. I am the type of person who prefers to see films at my local cinema for both nostalgia/cultural heritage reasons and because the experience in terms of the audio and visuals is better than what I have at home, but at the same time the cinema experience is so vulnerable to disruption when it comes to these kinds of films that it always feels like I’m gambling with time and money when I decide to go.